Apple Poaches Former Microsoft Security Chief

Ed Sutherland ()

Apple Poaches Former Microsoft Security Chief Apple has hired the former head of Microsoft and Mozilla security. Window Snyder had led the software giant’s Windows XP Service Pack 2 security efforts.

On her first day of work at the Cupertino, Calif. company Monday, Apple mentioned it was the “third browser-maker in the past five years that has employed Snyder.” However, the company did not specifically say she would be responsible for enhancing Safari’s security.

During her time at Microsoft, Snyder helped develop a program for the Redmond, Wash. company to talk with outside security researchers. At Mozilla, Snyder was in charge of security for the Firefox Web browser. Since leaving Mozilla in 2008, Snyder has been a consultant.

This isn’t the first security-related hire for Apple. In 2009, the company posted an ad seeking an iPhone security manager. The same year, Apple hired Ivan Krstic, a security leader for the XO system promoted by the One Laptop Per Child effort.

[via AppleInsider and PCWorld]

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About the author

Ed Sutherland

Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.

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  • Marginal

    “She”?

  • Chris

    Does anyone else find it ironic that Apple hires a former Microsoft security chief?

  • Ferd

    Definitely a she. The picture used is not her.

  • mick

    Her name is WIndow?

  • http://www.theusesofliteracy.com duncan

    She’s pretty amazing.

  • poppa

    Strange I thought Apple security was top notch, is this keep your friends close and your enemy’s closer..
    swapping people from one company to another is a bit odd, you leave yourself open to industrial espionage.

  • Michael K

    Firefox used her so Microsoft probably just didn’t listen.

    Security!? We don’t need no stinking security!